Roger Torres - Crafty Lil Canines

Roger Torres started Crafty Little Canines as a way to escape the rat race and own his own business. He came up with the idea for dog treats and enlisted his daughter's help. They experimented with different recipes and found that adding a secret ingredient made the treats last longer. They started selling at vendor events and eventually figured out how to ship the treats by dehydrating them after baking. The business has four flavors: sweet potato and cinnamon, apple carrot, peanut butter, and banana and peanut butter. Roger does all the cooking and his daughter helped with the designs and research. They tested the treats on their own dog before selling them. They had some setbacks with their website but overcame them and now sell their treats online at craftylittlecanines.com. They also participate in vendor events. Alright, my guest tonight is Roger Torres of Crafty Little Canines. Yes. Thank you so much for coming on. Thank you for having me. So let's just start out. I know it's a little bit of a, I mean it has to be a very difficult subject, but if we could just take it back to how you started Crafty Little Canines. Yeah, definitely. The idea, I came up with the idea. The name came two weeks after, but I was in a situation where, you know, I, just like everyone else, everyone's tired of doing the rat race, you know, I was ready to own my own business. I'm 40 something years old. You know, I was just really wanting to go out and do something. And with that, you know, I, when I come up with it, when I came up with the idea for the dog treats, I called my daughter up and again, she, you know, she was the top of her field. She was a great salesperson. So she had all the attributes that, the same, we'll just say the same ambition that I have. And I told her about it. She was like, let's do it. The entrepreneur spirit. The entrepreneur spirit, man. And you know, we just, we went after it. Sorry. No, it's okay. Take your time. Yeah. No, we just, we, it just kind of started from there and little by little, we, she, she actually was on the site trying to figure out different recipes. I think we originally had about eight to 10 recipes and once we did all those, we realized quickly that it was a headache to do. So we had blueberries, we had all these different types, you know, just, I mean, the, you know, the kitchen was a complete mess and we actually boiled it down to the four and that's the four we have here. Okay. And that was exciting. So now, now that we figured out what we wanted to sell, it came down to, okay, how do we make these treats last? So when we originally started making these things, it was, uh, they would last about four days and then they would start getting moldy. Okay. So all natural ingredients. Yeah. All natural ingredients. Exactly. Exactly. So that was the, the obstacle of, okay, how do we make these treats last a little longer? So, um, my wife actually came up with the idea of adding a secret recipe that we have. So we actually added that on there and realized that, uh, those treats went from four days to about seven days, eight days max. So we were like, okay, well I guess that will work for vendor type stuff. So we did a few vendors. Um, I mean we, we sold out every time we went out. We sold out and you know, my daughter and I was starting to wonder like, okay, so now I guess we're ready for shipping. So how do we do that? So it lasts, the product lasts a little longer, right? So, uh, she actually came up with the idea of dehydrating the, uh, the treats after, after baking them. So that kind of saved our business, you know? So now it went from, you know, four days, seven days. Now they're lasting up to a month, right? So it's, it, she definitely, you know, she was, yes, she was the driving force behind all this. So that's, yeah, that's originally how we, how we got started. I came up with the idea. She kind of did everything else, you know, she did the designs of the bags. She did the research for the, uh, recipes. She designed the website. She, it's all her, so I'm just kind of carrying on the spirit of Crafty Little Canines at this point. That's awesome. Okay. So there's four different flavors? Four different flavors. For the recipes? Yes. Um, do you want to go over those? Of course. Yeah, definitely. We have, uh, the, uh, dehydrated sweet potato and cinnamon. Of course, as, like I mentioned before, cinnamon is like one of the main ingredients that we use to keep everything fresh and lasting longer. And actually, just a quick insight, you can actually use cinnamon for, uh, plants for like, um, to keep them from molding. So that's what we, that's why we use it for our treats. So, you know, to keep it from molding. But here we have the cinnamon and, and, uh, sweet potato dehydrated. It's kind of like a chip type texture to it. Apple, carrot, peanut butter with apple and carrot being the main ingredient and then banana and peanut butter, pumpkin and peanut butter as well. Nice. So yes, we... And these are still, they're all being cooked up in your kitchen? Yes, every single one of them. I'm there. A lot of work. Yeah, I'm there. I'm shredding. I'm cutting. I'm, I'm doing everything. Wow. It's, it's just me and, you know, it keeps me busy. So, um, when, like I said, when we originally started the, the whole business, I, I was a salesperson for a dealership here and decided to just to quit my full-time job and... You just took that name tag off of that shirt and put it in the trash can. Put it in the trash can as I try, you know. So I, you know, I, and just a quick thing. She, uh, I came up with the idea of having uniforms and she didn't like that idea. No. It's too much. It's too much. She's like, are we on a business? I was like, we don't need a uniform. Did she come up with a name too? How did that name come about? The name? We kind of, we take back the, we take back and forth the name, uh, for about two weeks, uh, after we decided, okay, I'll treat this as, you know, what we're wanting to do. Now it's coming up with a catchy name. So we, we dug through, you know, different, you know, sites, different, just different ideas. And finally just crafty. Oh, that's crafty. You know, crafty. You know, crafty, crafty. Okay. Crafty little canine. And there it was. So it was just like, that's perfect. You know, we'll just stick with that. And I think there was like three different names. One of them, which, um, I can't even remember which one, but my wife came up with the name. Her sister came up with the name. My brothers came up with the names. I was like, you know. It is an effort. It's like a family effort. Yeah. Everyone was trying to chime in. Definitely. I love it though. Thank you. Thank you. Good. So like the testing. Do you use your own dogs? I do, yes. How did you figure it out? With each product that we have here. Again, before passing, we, so for instance, we originally started off with the, um, uh, peanut butter and banana and the pumpkin and peanut butter. So we gave that to my dog Bear and he's actually on our website. Uh, precious dog. So anyway, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we So all of our bags, you'll see that they have little marks. It's marked out the site.square or square.site. So I had just finished a website. My daughter had, you know, she designed everything. I think I put the, the last of one of the pictures I was going to put on there so we can go ahead and start testing it and getting ready to have customers come on. So I test it, I pull out my wallet, I'm ready to pay for my own products, kind of see how everything goes, make sure there's, you know, take care of all the glitches. Well, I get an email from Square and they're like, well, your account's no longer activated. I'm like, what happened? So I call them up and they're like, well, because everything was under my daughter's name. Yeah, so her social, everything, and it made me, that right there almost stopped me, you know, because I was so upset. I was so mad. And I was like, you know what, in, in, in the spirit of my daughter, I knew she would try to figure out a way to, to overcome that. So I, you know, with her in mind, I was like, you know, I'm not giving up. So I decided to buy a domain name, go with a different platform and just redo, just redo the entire thing. So yeah, that, that's why you'll, you know, I'll have that little scratch out there, but the website, yes, our sales goes to www.craftylittlecanines.com. And we also do vendor events here. We're actually going to do one this Saturday at the Paintbrush Alley Market Days. So we're excited about that. I say we, it's really me. I'm not going to be out there. So I'm selling, I'm marketing, I'm baking, I'm, you know, I say we. So yes, you know, it's, it's exciting. We know they're going to be watching the we, so we just tell them. They're like, who's the we? Is he French? He doesn't look French. It's a little dark to be French, but it's all right. But yeah, we're going to, we're going to be out there. We're, I say we again. But we are excited. We are excited to be out there. You know, I want to bring him. He gets very antsy when he gets around too many people. He's just one of those playful dogs. You know, he wants to hang out with the kids. Yeah. He just wants to be out there. So I'm like, dude, that's so awesome. Yeah. Well, I brought him out one time to an event and he did okay, but it was close to the end where he was getting a little antsy now and it's getting a little hotter, you know, he's just, like, okay, I'm tired of sitting in one spot. Dad, like, let's go somewhere else. Yeah. Vendor events, online sales. And I am trying to connect with several businesses here to see if we're able to actually put our product inside their stores. So I'll be making connections here pretty soon. I took the, I had the guts. When my daughter was around, she, she gave me the idea. She goes, dad, why don't you go to these hotels? I'm like, well, what do you mean by hotels? She was like, well, a lot of these people, that bring their companions over when, you know, they stay at hotels and stuff, but there's nothing for them there as far as treats or dog food or anything. I was like, that's, that's actually a pretty good idea. So I started heading out to some of these hotels trying to speak with their managers, corporate and stuff like that. They're like, well, that's a good idea, you know, but how's online sales? I was like, all right, you got me there. I was like, let me get online sales going. And then, you know, I'll come back and let you know, like, hey, people are looking for this. People are, you know, searching for this product. What about like the local, like pet food stores or like Pierhart or Palmer's, you know, those, like, I haven't, you know, I haven't connected with them yet, but that is, that is my next mission. Right now, I, we are actually busy as far as vendor events. So every Saturday, I think we have a couple of schools in town. Premier is one of them. Angelo Catholic school, I think that is another that we're going to end up doing. So we're, we're back to back. Yeah, we're on the go. But during the week, you know, it is, it is something that I am, I'm striving to, to kind of push the product out there and get the brand. That's awesome, though. Thank you. So how long, how long has Crafty Little Canines been? Like, how long have you had the business? We started it in January of this year. January of this year. It went all the way through May and due to unfortunate events, we had to stop and we I just picked it up again last month. So it's less than a year. Yes, less than a year. And with the pause, probably even less than six months. But I see you guys everywhere. Yeah, you know, like I said, you know, my daughter was a go getter. You know, she's, you know, she was the top of her field. She was the top, you know, salesperson in her field. You know, she's so she worked at ATB or Sam's at the time. And she was selling the cards, you know, those people, right? Yeah, you know, get you a little card. But yes, she was she was the top salesperson. And not only that, you know, she owned her own business, you know, at one point, and she, you know, just naturally, she was the person I was like, Yep, you know, like, I'm gonna call her. She's the first person I'll think of. And let's, let's run it. So, you know, with her experience in business, my experience in sales, we just kind of blended that together. And her and I were the perfect, you know, the A team. Yeah, definitely. Thinking long term, what would you say, like your goals for the business are? You know, long term, I have not really thought that far right now. Yes. You know, get up in the morning, get you can do what you want. It is a lot of work. You know, I don't want to work for somebody else. You got to do it all yourself. Exactly. So I'm sitting back and I see my bank account. I'm like, Yeah, I think it's time to do something. But right now, yes. So there's three revenues that I'm focusing on right now, which is the vendors, the online sales right now, we're trying to get on board as far as shipping on the platform that we have. I mean, it shows, you know, these people just checking out the website and all different parts of the country, you know, California, Arizona, and I'm like, Why am I not capitalizing on this? Right now? So shipping is another venue that we're going to end up going with at some point. So vendors, online sales, I do local delivery in town, shipping will be the next thing. And then eventually either getting into like HEB. And some of the local businesses here, I do want to keep it local. I know that's something that I do want to do. And eventually kind of move down to like Abilene, Austin, which I feel like Austin is going to be like the place for us. You're going to need your own plant to produce. You know, with that, I was, my wife and I talked about that. And we are, I am saving up with so I'm right now at this point, I'm just kind of building capital. And with that capital, try to, you know, get a little storefront business going with, you know, with that building, I can produce more, I can do more, I can, you know, it's my space, you know, I can, you have to make as much as I want and ship it off to, you know, winter, wherever. So that's, that's the next phase. And what we're trying to accomplish is, one, the shipping. We're shipping to, you know, build a, have a business set up. A storefront. A storefront, exactly, yes. Yeah. And then you can have some employees help you do the baking. You know, I think I still like to do it. I'm very... Really? You gotta do it yourself? I'm like that too. I gotta do it myself, man. Don't trust anybody else. I, you know, kind of. I like my names on there. Exactly, exactly. So, you know, when we started this business and my daughter-in-law was like, every delivery that we make, you know, it's fresh, it's baked fresh, it's not sitting in a tub for three, four weeks and then, oh, let's just sell it, you know, just to get rid of it. No, I get, if it sits there longer than two weeks, I trash it, you know, or do something with it, but I will not sell it, I'll make something fresh and, you know, that's, that's the, that's what we try to accomplish is everything fresh. So you have the four treats. Yes. Eventually, is that something you would think of too, like adding different things to your product line or? Yes, right now I'm kicking around a few ideas. I'm not sure where I want to go with it just yet, but my daughter- These are all natural, I gotta try them. Yeah, yeah. Do I try one? Yeah, go right ahead. Which flavors? Let's see, I, you know, my favorite is actually the apple and carrot. I've actually tried that with some organic maple syrup. This one, apple and carrot? I'm going to try a little piece here. I'm going to test it. Yeah, definitely. You know, in these vendor events, I've had customers be like, whoa, you know, they're like, we can eat it, right? I was like, of course you can. I go, if your little kid gets a hold of it, you know, you don't have to worry. It's okay. Yeah. And they would, they would sit there and kind of eat it in front of me. I'm going to eat a piece if I don't, if I don't, you know, if I don't choke, you know. We got some water around here somewhere. These are actually pretty good. It's got a little flavor to it. A little grainy, but, oh wow. These are good. That's good stuff, really. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I'm going to have to get some for myself. Do one of those doomsday type things, you know, keep it to the shelf, you know, to dehydrate it. All right. So let's see, we talked about your products, where you'd like to go. We talked about events. You let us know your upcoming events. And you all are always welcome at any of ours at Love & Leashes. Okay, perfect, perfect. Yeah, so I can send you when we do any of our, like we have a Halloween one coming up on the 28th if you're available. I can make room. Yeah, our clients will, you know, they'll buy a whole line. There you go. You've heard that guys, right? You gotta buy a whole line. That's good. And some water. There is, we're actually doing another event in November, the Concho Cano Club at the Foster Communication. Okay, at EKC. Yeah, and we're going to end up doing that as well. One of the event coordinators reached out to us and said, hey, you know, we think you'd be perfect for it. I was like, well, okay then, let's go. Awesome, where did you go? I already put my down payment. I got my spot set up. I'm like, let's rock and roll, man. All right. Let's go, let's go. My wife would always make fun of me because doing, you know, every time I'm at these little vendor events, I have the little live Facebook thing going on. I would always say, www.craftylittlecanines.com. She's like, Roger, she goes, every time you say that, you bring that extra W. So she goes, now I, you know, now it's in my head. She's like, www.craftylittlecanines.com. So now, you know, it's silly, but it really is those small things that you've got to really focus. People are like, www. Okay, we can't. We missed something. Yeah, we missed something. Your site's down. Yeah. What's really in these biscuits? That's the secret. That's the secret recipe. Cinnamon and something else. Yeah, it was good for us. It's good for our animal companions. Cinnamon's code for us. It is the code. Do you hear the music through the headphones? You know, I do hear it. Is that the church? Yeah, this is it. They're still going, no? I wonder if that's going to come across. That's like the perfect exit. You know, and then the hallelujah song from the back. We're going to break for some gospel. We'll be back. Do you guys hear it? Yeah. Do you think this is our sponsor? I don't want to hold you here all night with the church choir. No, no, no. Honestly, I do appreciate you reaching out to us so we can get this brand out there and, you know, not just in San Angelo. And that's another thing I should probably mention. One of my daughter's biggest things when we started this business is that we actually do want to help. It's not just a quick buck and throw it and, you know, do something with it. We want to help. And when I say by help, you know, we've actually looked at paws, you know, write out a check for them. Or not just write out a check, but how can we volunteer? How can we do this? How can we do that? So it's not just helping ourselves. It's helping the community that's supporting us. And not just dogs, cats, rabbits. You know, it didn't matter. All animals. All animals. Yeah, we have some horse rescues around here too. Really? Okay. Yeah, there's all kinds. Definitely, definitely. And, you know, it doesn't just boil down to animals as well. You know, my personal thing was helping my Boys and Girls Club. Just kind of just name it. The kids, yeah. Yeah, just kind of name it a couple of things. But that's another goal that we are trying to accomplish. And that's, you know, I know that's one of the things to be like, yes, let's do that, Dad. No, that's great. Yeah, this community definitely needs more positivity. Definitely. And people, you know, lending out hands to help. You see all the negativity about, you know, when you go online. Like it's great for promotion, but there's a lot of negative stuff on social media. Yes. So the more, you know, love we can spread and positive messaging and helping each other instead of judging each other. Like coming together, working together type thing. Definitely. You know, it's a community. It changes a lot of people's perspective, you know. And not just making a quick buck. It's helping your fellow neighbor, man. Helping your other businesses out. You know, again, when we started this business, one of these little vendors that we did, who was the other one? It was Sugar Rush. They made cotton candy. Hey, Sugar Rush. Yes, I'm funny out there, guys. But we would go out there and just, hey, say quick something or walk around. Hey, what's your business? What's your name? You know, I just did it at the Elite Physique. We were down there and there was three of us left. I told them, you know, only the strong survive. You know, it was hot. You know, it was windy. Everything was blowing around everywhere. And it came down from like seven vendors to the last three. Hold on to the tent for me. You see what I mean? You see it. You guys are working hard, man. You're working hard. But, yeah, you know, I'd go out there and, like, hey, what's your name? What's your business? Let's throw it out there. Let's keep it going, you know. Right, right. Keep small business going. So it's not just about me. It's about how can I help, you know. My fellow small business owners. Right. We're going to sponsor some more gospels with us. It's going to sound like we're doing an infomercial. Yeah. For a dollar a day. You can sponsor with San Angelo Small Business Owner. That's funny. We need your support. We need it. We need it. We'll support you back. That's what we're talking about. That's right. That's what we said. Support one another. Right. Support one another. Yeah. Thank you so much for coming. Thank you for having me. And taking some time out of where you have no time to. It's hard. It's so hard. Somebody save me. No. But, no, we do appreciate. I appreciate you inviting us down here to kind of tell our story. No problem. And, you know, show off our new baggages. Yeah, you guys, did you see the back of it? It's got all the health tingles in it. It's got all the info on there. So, it shows the ingredients and the benefits for each ingredient. That's something I think that was important that we wanted to incorporate. We started off with little brown packages. Yeah. Yeah. The little brown things. Yeah. The plastic. Yeah. We had to switch from those because we noticed that humidity was getting in. So, when I picked up the package, it was a tear on some of the bags. Some of the bags at the very bottom. Oh, wow. So, some of the air, everything was getting in. It was, you know, just. They were going bad. Yeah. Yeah. So, I felt embarrassed. I'm like, no. It was cheap. I get it. But, you know, you get what you pay for. So, when my, you know, when my daughter and I came across this company right here, she was like, Dad, she was, you know, we got to invest a little bit in this. I was like, I think you're right. You went to the grocery store. Yeah. That was kind of the look we were going for. Very professional. Definitely. Thank you. I mean, that's easy to take to, like she was saying, like that Pure Heart Boutique. You know, you take that in there. They can literally just take it, put it on the shelves, and they look. Yeah. Pure Heart. They would take these. Yeah. Pure Heart. Hey. Message me. Take them. Let me know. Can you sell them? All natural. Yeah. All natural. All natural. Locally made. Locally sourced. There you go. That's right. Texas made. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Texas made. Texas made. Yeah. I think that's it. All right. I think we're good.